Muse: The Sixth Titan
by SilverTortoise
Summary: Enter Sarah Miller. Homeless, kicking bad guy's butts... and a mutant. Her extraordinary powers attract the attention of a certain worst enemy of the Teen Titans. After they take her in, more mysteries are discovered then can be answered... Rob/OC, Cy/Rae
1. Battle In the Dark

**Hey, friends! this is my first full-length fanfic, so I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I have enjoyed planning and writing it...**

**Please read and REVIEW if you've got time... I would really appreciate to get any feedback you have to offer me. :)**

**A discaimer: I do not own Teen Titans, or any of its wonderful characters. T****he only things I own are the plot and my main character, Sarah Miller. If you doubt my power, beware the Titan attack #567! (Wow, I just totally pulled that out of nothing...)**

**Enjoy!**

* * *

**Chapter One: Battle In the Dark**

A dizzying swirl of color greeted her. Slowly, and with some difficulty, she managed to straighten the muddy images into something more recognizable, that evil face.

"Quite enough to be going on with," she muttered, and swung her hand up and out toward the tall, shadowed figure in front of her. What looked like a shaft of brilliant white light emerged from her outstretched palm, twisting and pulsing like a living thing. The man in front of her stiffened, though she knew he couldn't see the light; he could only feel its clutching power. Concentrating, she mentally tightened the shimmering band of light around the man, hoping to throw him off balance. For a moment, he was in her power, struggling in a glowing noose only she could see... And then, without warning, he had disengaged himself from the cloying light, leaped toward her, hands raised, poised to strike... _Crap_... She tried to retaliate, drawing her arm back toward herself, pulling the glowing light back toward her body. Images were beginning to spin in front of her eyes again, and the light in front of her blinked, then guttered out as a momentary blackness settled in front of her vision.

"At last!" the man near her exclaimed, and she cried out and crumpled as a crushing blow landed on the top of her head. She was up in a moment, though, hands raised; her vision was still blurred. _Come on... why isn't this working? _She tried to conjure the light again, barely getting out of the way of another blow she could hardly see. Nothing happened in her hand, and she began to back away, dancing around to avoid the man's fists and feet. _Wow, since when can he move this fast? Shouldn't he be getting old pretty soon? Crap, come on... one more time... _She reached out her hands, seeking her power, and again felt a resistance; something was draining her of her strength. Raising her head, her vision momentarily cleared enough for her to make out the shadowed man. He was holding something in his hand, holding it out toward her. She became aware of a distinct mental pull from the object; the thing, whatever it was, was preventing her from creating the glowing shields. Snarling, she swung her fist up, directing it at the thing the man was holding. He swung it away from her with ease, his movements as fast as lightening. _Okay, this is it... last chance!_

* * *

"I can't believe this..." Beast Boy groaned, rubbing his head where he had bumped it; the tunnel's roof was too low, even for the small green guy. And it was pitch black. Perfection itself. "Are you sure this is the right way?"

The caped girl in front of him whirled around, at least as well as someone can whirl when scrambling through a cramped tunnel. Her soft voice was annoyed: "For the last time, yes, we are on the right track! Robin said to meet him at the end of this stupid tunnel, and yes, it is low. Now, stop complaining!"

Cowed, BB sighed and slid after her, accidentally scraping his left ear on the wall. "Ow!" he groaned, pausing again, " I don't think this was on my contract when I signed up... Oh, wait, there _wasn't _any contract... my bad..."

Raven stopped again, her blue hair glowing ominously, "For the last time, will you be quiet?!!" Beast Boy subsided into silence once more, still nursing his scraped ear. Raven resumed her crawling, then paused once more. "Couldn't you... turn into a tiny animal, or something? Like a snake, or something?"

This relatively simple solution had not actually occurred to Beast Boy, and he stammered a bit before replying, "Hey! Great idea! Um... yeah..."

"So, it actually hadn't occurred to you?" Raven asked, though it seemed more like a statement. A kind of funny statement. How like Beast Boy to look past the obvious to the impossible. She actually almost smiled. Unfortunately, Beast Boy missed out on seeing this rare expression on her face, because the tunnel ended quite suddenly, leaving them crawling airily on... nothing. Which is a great experience, except one can't keep crawling like that forever because one has to hit hard rock sooner or later. Which is what Raven and Beast Boy did, after a moment.

"Ahhh..." BB groaned, " I think I dislocated something... something vital..." Raven suffered her own physical discomfort in silence, rising smoothly from the ground and straightening her cloak around her. There was light here, though it was dim, and she now could see that their little fall had an audience... a very entertained one. Robin, Cyborg, and Starfire were standing just a little ways away, trembling with silent laughter. Cyborg was actually having difficulty keeping his balance.

"Okay, show's over..." Raven muttered, stepping around a still-prone Beast Boy, who was shaking his head slowly as if to make sure it was still attached to his neck properly. "Let's go," the blue-haired girl sighed, striding past her shaking companions.

Robin, ever the leader, managed to regain most of his dignity, and dragged his scanner from a hidden pocket. Flipping it over, he examined it briefly, "All right, we need to go that way... Slade's last location was somewhere down those stairs..." Pointing into the dimness, he began to walk carefully toward the dimly outlined staircase. Behind him, Beast Boy gathered himself up from the ground. Starfire and Cyborg moved to follow their leader, and Raven, realizing that she had been about to go the wrong way, quickly corrected her steps. Together, the five Titans moved slowly down the spiraling staircase, ready to take on whatever might appear at the bottom.

* * *

_How can this be happening?_ For the first time, she felt fear. _I've gotta make it... _She stumbled backward from another blow; her vision seemed somewhat clearer, though still shaky. She still couldn't seem to get out of the way of the tall man's blows, though... They seemed to be coming from everywhere at once. In a matter of seconds, she took one punch to the stomach, quickly managed to evade having her nose broken, and got another glancing blow to the side of the head. Her vision wavered. _Didn't his mother ever teach him not to hit girls? _But then she thought that this evil man surely never had a mother; _he probably just appeared out of the ground one day. Or arose out of someplace really low... _

* * *

The Titans could hear scuffling sounds up ahead; there were random flashes of light, shouts. Then a girl screamed.

"Come on!" Robin was on a mission, leaping forward into the huge cavern at the foot of the stairs. His companions were right behind, primed for a fight. With a roar, Beast Boy turned himself into a huge, charging elephant. Glowing, green orbs appeared in Starfire's hands; her sweet face held an anger in it that seemed uncharacteristic of the young alien, but for this enemy there would be no mercy.

Robin and Raven were the first to come into sight of the battle ahead, and stopped short. A strange sight greeted them; two figures were locked in mortal combat. One was a tall, overpowering man whose face seemed shadowed or masked; the other was a girl, even smaller than Starfire, and her hands waved in front of her as she blocked and parried the tall man's fists. Her face was set, her eyes darting here and there, is though searching for a way out of a maze.

Robin leaped forward, raising his hands in a challenge: "Slade! Leave her alone!" The man stopped raining his blows on the girl, turning his face slightly toward the five Titans. Taking the opportunity, the small girl leaped up, almost into the man's face, landing a blow near his left eye. The man seized the girl by one slim arm, slinging her away from himself as if she weighed nothing. The girl landed very hard, tried to rise again at once, but fell back with a faint moan. Her head sunk to the floor of the cavern.

The masked man turned to the Titans, "Ah... Robin... So glad you could... join us." His voice was silky smooth, oily, and Robin curled his hands into fists, gritting his teeth to keep from retorting back; he didn't need to give his worst enemy any ammunition. "Why did you have to interrupt our little fight?" Slade continued, raising a hand, "Sarah and I were simply getting... acquainted."

"You're gonna get what you deserve, Slade," Robin replied, glancing quickly beyond the masked man at the girl; she was still lying on the ground, quite still. Robin was worried about her. He came forward, raising his hands.

"Try if you can, Robin," Slade murmured, nodding slowly, "Come on... try it." Something inside Robin seemed to snap, and he leaped forward. But before he could reach Slade, the taller man stepped aside, moving with surprising speed. Jumping up onto a nearly platform, he pulled something from a hidden pocket. There was a split second of pure silence, then the world seemed to explode; shards of shattered rock rained down on the Titans, and Raven quickly raised a force field over the others to protect them from being cut to pieces. After one heart-stopping moment, the rubble stilled, though dust still billowed around the five of them. Robin, blinking, looking around.

"Hey! Where'd he go?" Cyborg cried, lifting aside some larger pieces of rock that had landed dangerously close to Starfire. Robin couldn't see or hear Slade anywhere nearby, and his scanner didn't show his life sign at all... He had completely disappeared. Spinning around, the spiky-haired teen took in the chaotic scene, then stopped dead at the sight of a small pile of rubble nearby.

_Oh God..._ Much of the rubble had landed right on top of an unconscious, small, teenage girl.


	2. Awaking

Greetings, my dear friends! I appologize with great sadness that this update has taken sooo long to post... I hope that you haven't totally lost patience with me...

I know that this is a rather weird chapter, but please bear with me... I promise that the next one will be much more structured.

A disclaimer: I unfortunately DO NOT own Teen Titans or any of the original characters,

as much as I may want to... Sadness!

Please review!

* * *

Things were spinning. No, _she _was spinning, and everything else was frozen like ice. Strange. There were sounds, too, and they seemed a bit easier to understand. One voice seemed very low, and another seemed very high…

* * *

"Wow." Beastboy was always one to sum up amazing, mind-blowing bits of information in single words. He also was good at accidentally knocking into stuff. A shockingly annoying alarm went off.

"Oy!" Cyborg cried, carefully replacing the monitor, "Dude! This is my new baby! I don't want you messing her up!"

The five Titans were standing, squished together, in what Cyborg had called his "baby," which was actually a special new life support system that had been added to the lower level of one of the Titan submarines. They were currently on auto pilot, drifting back to the Tower, and there were lots of strange beeps and whines coming from the mechanism of the support unit. The object of their interest was not the machinery, however, but rather a small, pale girl who lay quite still on the cramped bed. Numerous support monitors had been attached to her person, onto her arms, upper chest, and even her head. Scanners swept up and down her body, searching for injuries.

"Um, I think that this is a bit of overkill," Robin began, surveying the screens surrounding the fragile-looking girl… though it would seem that she was a lot less fragile than one might suspect. "No broken bones, no internal injuries, skin abrasions at a minimal."

"Wow…" Beastboy murmured again, shifting his position so that he could see the girl's face in repose.

"She should have been crushed beneath the mountainous pile of rock!" Starfire squealed; the limited space was telling on her a bit, and her emotions were rising to the surface.

"Indeed," Raven added, also leaning forward a little, "When we lifted off all the rubble… I thought it would be over."

"But the fact is that it's not," Robin said, pushing a few buttons so that the scanners would cease their roving. The beeps silenced themsleves, and only a few flashing lights remained. "She survived something that could have killed any of us, and she was fighting Slade… and holding her own. I think we're dealing with someone pretty special." Robin was one to speak what everyone else was thinking.

"Personally, I think we should wake her up and find out who she is," Beastboy said, rocking back and forth a bit with impatience; ever since he had laid eyes on the girl fighting the Titans' worst enemy, he had wanted to find out who she was.

"That's what I want to do, too, BB," Robin replied," but we have a problem… She's… unconscious."

"And I don't know why!" Cyborg groaned, pushing several buttons at once in hope of finding an answer, "According to everything, she should be awake and talking to us right now, but she appears to be…"

"Asleep." Raven interjected, retreating to the door. She hated being in enclosed spaces with a lot of people for any amount of time, "She's sleeping. We should let her rest." With that, the gothic girl left the small chamber and retreated to the upper level. The door slid closed behind her.

"Hm." Robin looked thoughtful. He turned to Cyborg, master of machines. "You really think she could be sleeping?"

"Dude, I really don't know _what _to think… First I thought that she was dead, then the readings told me that she's hardly hurt at all, and now the brain wave monitor is showing deep, non-REM sleep. It's got me."

Robin sighed, and then turned to leave as well. "I guess we'll have to wait and see when she wakes up." He slid open the door, looked back once at the sleeping girl, then slid out.

Beastboy, Starfire, and Cyborg were left alone with their thoughts, which were considerable.

"I wonder if she shall join us in our many lovely adventures," Starfire sighed, looking down on the sleeping girl, "or if she will have to go away?" Similar thoughts had occurred to the two guys, but they let Star voice them aloud.

* * *

There was movement, the colors were shifting. Sarah tried to collect her thoughts, reaching out for anyone around her, but felt nothing. It was as if she was all alone in a void except for the shifting colors and strange voices. She was pleased to discover that she didn't feel any pain. _That's new… I'm glad that creep didn't chop off my arm or something after I fell. _She tried to reach out again with her mind and felt nothing. _Weird. I wonder what happened to those people that showed up during our fight… They were dressed in such strange clothes. I wonder if they're superheroes or something._ She struggled. _Why can't I move? _She pushed against whatever it was that was keeping her from sensing or moving, and felt it give a little. She leaned against it again, and it began to shift…

"… and then the milkshake was all over the place!"

_Whoa… who... just said that? _The barrier between her mind and the real world had lifted for just a moment, and that, of all things, was what had come through. _And that doesn't help me at all…_ She struggled again, and was this time rewarded with a riot of smells… pizza? _Okay, I can do this, one sense at a time, I guess…_ The next thing that assailed her was a sensation of warmth; it seemed she was wrapped in some kind of fuzzy material, and her head was pillowed. Almost immediately after processing this new sensation, Sarah became acutely aware that her mouth was dry; very dry. _Ugh… nasty. I'm really thirsty. Almost there… _

And then her vision came, swimming, swirling, fading in and out, but it was there. And the sounds returned with vengeance.

"No way!" someone bellowed very close to her.

"And then, and then…" another person choked, apparently unable to suppress laughter.

Sarah forced her eyes open further, struggling to focus, and the first thing she recognized as a human-like figure was… _green. _There was another person-thing nearby, too, a huge and shiny one. Her head was spinning, her mouth aching from lack of water. A high-pitched voice shrieked near her, "SHE'S AWAKE!!!!!!" and a strange mask that seemed to be floating all by itself was wafting toward her…

Sarah crumpled in a dead faint.


	3. Meetings and Colors

Well, hello again everyone, it's SilverTortoise! It's been a while, nearly two years... :( How is everyone? I was reading back through my stories and I realized that I couldn't just leave poor Sarah hanging like that, without a story, so here I am once more! Hopefully it hasn't been too long since my last update to have this all still make sense, but here you go! This is a short chapter, but there will be more to come.

Note: I do not own Teen Titans or any of the characters from that show. However, Sarah is my own, and she knows it... she was born from my brain, after all :)

* * *

_That was... unceremonious..._

She could feel her consciousness returning, with it a wave of trembling embarrassment.

"Booya!" a very loud person yelled from beside her, but she didn't faint this time. Instead, she tilted her head slightly in order to take a closer look at the shadowy, shifting person beside her. Wait. They we're fuzzy, that was still her vision. _Crap._

"Um, greetings, small teenage girl!" This time it was a mild, female voice that spoke, her intonation strange yet... humorous. "YEAH! HI!" squealed yet another voice, a guy this time, and he was quickly hushed by the loud person immediately next to Sarah.

_Okay, I reeeally should say something..._

She raised her head slightly, which triggered a collective gasp from the vague room around her. _Jeepers how many people are in here?_

"Um..." Her voice was terrible. She tried again, "Um, hi. Uh, where... where am I, exactly?"

"In Titan's tower," a new voice replied, another guy, "and you're safe from Slade here. We're friends." _Safe from Slade... _Well, that was truly comforting.

"Well, uh, I'm Sarah, everyone, and I... I _really_ don't know where I am still, so – how did you find me?" her vision wavered again for a second, then began to gain some more clarity. She became instantly aware that there were five people in the room with her, three guys, two girls, and they all seemed... friendly. At least, one of the girls was straight-up pink, the other was purple with a few flashes of pink around the corners, the huge on next to her was particularly shiny, and small one who had yelled was... _green... weird... _and the other guy, the other guy –

"So what the heck were you doing fighting Slade all by yourself, girl?" demanded the big shiny one beside her, "I mean, what the heck?" He seemed nearly beside himself. Sarah was beginning to sense a similar emotion from the darker purple-hued girl, but it quickly vanished; Sarah suspected that eh purple girl was pretty good at keeping her emotions concealed.

"Well, you see," she began, sitting up a little more and twisting the fuzzy blanket in her fists, "I didn't _want _to fight him, it's just... Well, he's been interested in my movements for a while. I knew he was following me. So, well, I realized that I couldn't just keep pretending he wasn't there, so – I approached him." There was another collective sigh from her listeners, and the pink girl actually clapped her hands to her mouth. "Um..." Sarah wasn't sure why they were reacting this way, but she continued. "Anyways, he was a lot stronger than I had thought, so things really really sucked for a while..." Suddenly she remembered all those blows to the head, and the rubble, and the scraping rock floor. Hurriedly she put a hand to her head and was relieved to feel no pain.

_Good..._

"So, that's me, and I don't mean to be rude, but, who exactly are you people?"

The shiny guy spoke first, "I'm Cyborg, member of the Teen Titans."

"and I'm BEASTBOY!" cried the small green guy, his color shifting quickly from green to gold and back again.

"Raven..." the dark purple girl murmured, and Sarah once again felt the other girl's emotions withdraw from the scene; it seemed that the girl didn't trust her yet.

"I am Starfire!" chirped the shining pink girl, and now Sarah could make out her eyes – they were full of light.

"And I'm Robin," concluded the third guy, and now Sarah could see him clearly; he was red.

_Cool..._

"And we're the Teen Titans, girl!" Cyborg cried, his colors growing even brighter with pride.

Sarah smiled at them, drawing in their emotions, testing out the field patterns in the room.

_Yes, I can trust them._

_

* * *

_

Starfire was twirling around her so fast it felt like _she_ was spinning, too. The pink girl smiled. Sarah was glad that she could recognize facial expressions again.

"Are you ready for the trying on of the new clothes?" Starfire squealed, holding up a dark object that Sarah guessed was a dress.

"Yeah, sure," she replied, grasping the object. It _was_ a dress... a soft one. "Um, give me a moment..." She moved into the bathroom, stripped off her old, gross clothes, and slipped into this new attire. It seemed to fit well, and it felt good against her skin. She went back out of the bathroom to find Starfire clapping her hands together in anticipation. Sarah smiled kindly, then moved to look at herself in the mirror.

She always hated doing this, since things in mirrors sometimes... weren't that friendly. But she looked anyway. "Well, how do you feel?"Starfire burst out, unable to contain herself any longer, "Is it soft enough to be felt as comfortable?"

"Yeah, it's really soft," Sarah replied, gazing at her reflection shrewdly in an attempt to really determine it looked alright. "Well, I know this is a weird question, but, could you tell me what color this is?" She hated having to ask, but most people always assumed that she was color-blind. _I'm okay with that..._

Starfire paused for only a second before chirping, "It's blue! A blue of the emerald..."

Sarah wasn't sure exactly what color _that_ might be, since she had heard that most emeralds were green, but she just went with it. At least it wasn't yellow or orange or something. She turned herself to get the side view. _Wow... I really need to start eating more... Like a stick! _She smiled to herself, then turned quickly from the mirror to get away from it. There. Now she could go a while without having to use one.

"Are you ready? Do you wish to see your new friends again?" Starfire seemed eager to rejoin the other Titans, so Sarah followed the bubbly pink girl out of the bedroom, down a narrow hall, and so some even narrower stairs. Once they were down these, however, everything opened up suddenly into a huge room full of windows. Sarah sighed inwardly, since she hadn't like the enclosed spaces she had just come through, but then inwardly cringed when Starfire announced suddenly to the room of Titans,

"Our new friend Sarah, she cannot see of colors!" Triumphantly. She said this triumphantly.

_Oh great..._


	4. Pancakes and Boys and Starfire Oh My!

Heyyy everyone! College and marriage and all that good stuff has been taking up my writing time, but for some reason I have a few hours to put into Fanfiction! Hooray! Hope you've been well since my last update... This story is taking forever! It's all in my head, just so hard to write it all down... Enjoy and review!

Disclaimer: I do not own Teen Titans. Sarah, though, is minez. Just FYI )

* * *

Chapter 4: Pancakes and Boys and Starfire... Oh My!

* * *

_A few days later..._

Ever since Sarah had become a live-in guest at Titan's Tower, she had been treated with the utmost respect and care, despite Starfire's... eagerness... to share personal information. Since all five Titans usually spent their days training, researching local crimes, and going into town to pick up pizza, Sarah found that any time to get to know these odd teenagers was scarce at best. She set out to remedy that.

"Breakfast."

Robin blinked at her for a moment. She could see eyes now, and mouths. His was twitching.

"Breakfast, Robin. I would like to make everyone pancakes tomorrow."

Still no response. A dreadful thought occurred to her, and she gasped, "You _do_ know what _pancakes_ are, right?"She could hardly keep herself from laughing as his eyes bugged out in embarrassment.

"Oh geez... No!" His face seemed to glow redder than usual; he seemed to be blushing. "I mean, of course I know what pancakes are... But, you see, normally Raven and I get up so much earlier than Cy and BB and Starfire so... we just all eat cereal."

She snorted. She had expected this was the case. "Okay then tomorrow's the weekend, so it's pancakes day. I've spent enough time here already to know that a meal together would be good for everyone, and besides... You've all been so nice to me, I wanna give something back." She smiled at Robin, hoping her combination of niceness and bossiness didn't come across in the wrong way.

He hesitated before responding, "That would be great. Thanks, Sarah." He smiled back, and she felt his hand pat her shoulder tentatively. It surprised and confused her; was he actually grateful for her offer or just humoring her out of politeness because of her status as "honored guest?"

"Well, I gotta check out some data..." Robin said vaguely, removing his hand and taking a quick step back. "Um... You can watch TV or whatever you want, okay?"

Sarah blinked, and Robin was gone when she looked again.

That boy was confusing as hell.

_And now... time to go shopping. I doubt this house has eggs or anything useful..._

* * *

"Mmmmmmmmmmm..."

There was a general chewing/enjoyment/yummy sound coming from Cyborg and Beastboy... They had been the first to rise the next morning despite their usual tendencies to get up late. Perhaps it had something to do with the fact that there was actual fresh, delicious breakfast food waiting for them. Sarah could help but beam at them as she watched their colors swirl and sparkle with the yumminess. _Pancakes...__the__world's__best__solver__of__all__things__bad_. There was a sounds behind her and Raven joined their little group, looking a little darker purple around the edges than usual.

"Hey, Raven... Pancake?" Sarah offered the blue-haired alien a plate, smiling.

"... Thanks..."

Beastboy looked up from his own plate, his mouth full of syrupy goodness, and chirped "Good morning, Raven-paven-fo-flaven..." He was cut off by an icy glare from the aforementioned Raven, who accepted her plate in silence and brooding. Sarah cleared her throat, sharing a glance with Cyborg that brought her to the edge of giggling. Raven seemed distant, almost moody, most of the time, but this morning she seemed to have woken up on the wrong side of the bed. Or maybe she always did, so today she must have woken up... _under__the__bed_. Sarah smiled in spite of herself, glad Raven's gaze was turned away so she wouldn't think that Sarah was laughing at her. No, Raven's seriousness was seriou. Very serious indeed.

There was a clatter and Starfire wooshed into the room (there was no other way Sarah could have described her movement), nearly colliding with the table in her eagerness to greet everyone.

"Good morningtime, friends!" she squealed as she embraced Sarah full on, nearly knocking the breath out of her. Starfire's entire body wriggled with joy as she surveyed the breakfast feast. "Oh Sarah you must be the master of all chefs!" she cried, releasing the other girl and gaping at the stack of pancakes before her, "I must learn these... cakes... Can you teach me?"

Sarah smiled fondly before replying, "Sure, but you need to have some pancakes inside of you before you can learn how to cook them..." She felt sure that Cyborg was struggling not to laugh as Starfire's smile grew wider.

"I shall get them inside me now!" Starfire crowed, and she immediately began to do just that. Her eyes squeezed shut in happiness after the first bite; Sarah knew they were closed because Star's normally huge sparkly orbs quickly shrank into little beams of joy.

Before Starfire could exclaim anything else, however, the group was joined by the final member, Robin. Sarah thought at once that he seemed kind of... faded. Like he was still tired even though he had come downstairs after all the rest of them. "'morning," he murmured, carefully lifting a large pancake onto the last plate and pouring syrup on it.

"Hey... you okay dude?" Cyborg asked, helping himself to seconds.

Robin paused before answering. "I'm fine... just tired. Been up all night monitoring Slade's signal. He's a bit closer than he was yesterday." He paused again, looked down rather sadly at his pancake, then up again at them all. "I think he'll be trying to attack the Tower again soon... maybe within a few days."

Sarah felt the happiness that had been slowly filling her deflate slightly. _Great...__Mr.__Grumpy__himself__on__his__way.__Just__when__things__were__getting__nice..._The reactions of the others seemed somewhat stronger than her own; Starfire gasped, Beastboy actually stopped with fork in mid-air, Cyborg sighed, and Raven retreated even further into herself.

Cyborg spoke first, "Okay, well, I've been working on some new defense stuff and I think they'll make him think twice before - "

"Slade is more powerful than before," Robin interjected, making Cyborg wilt a little.

"Yeah..." Raven's voice startled them as she spoke from her personal set of shadows, "He is... darker... than usual."

"Uh, like that's even possible," Beastboy said, his voice cracking a little on the last word.

"Yes," Robin continued, "He's gaining in power. I'm not sure why..." Here he glanced at Sarah, and she felt like he was scanning her, trying to read her mind to see if she knew more. "I... I don't know what's causing his surge in power, but we need to be proactive this time," he continued, cutting a bite out of his pancake and dipping it in syrup.

Sarah cleared her throat. "Well, I may have... something... to do with it. Maybe I should just go and... not endanger you any more." There was a general outcry from her companions, and her breath was suddenly squeezed away once more as Starfire again embraced her fiercly.

Robin was quiet for a moment as the others babbled about how Sarah had to stay and how it wasn't her fault. Then, when he spoke, it was softly and right to Sarah.

"You don't need to take on that burden, of running from Slade, all on yourself." he looked straight at her like he had when she'd first woken up that first day, so directly that she could see the brightness behind his eyes. "Slade is a bad enemy, sure, but there's only one of him..." "Thank God -" Beastboy interjected, "and there's six of us." Robin finished, smiling slightly. Sarah felt her face grow warm as she realized what he was saying; she was one of them, now, she was a Titan. They would stand behind her, she would have to keep running any more.

Not trusting herself to speak, she instead placed a hand nervously on Robin's shoulder as he had the day before. Robin continued smiling, and went on:

"Now, everyone, let's finish this awesome breakfast and then we have some work to do."

"Yeah!" Beastboy chorused, then blushed when he realized he was the only one. He quickly returned to eating his breakfast.

The others followed suit, though Sarah noticed that they all hurried a bit more now. Turning to Robin, she murmured, "Thanks."

He looked a little sad for a moment, then replied, "I'm just glad you don't have to run any more."

"And these pancakes are so beautiful!" Starfire cried; she waved her arms in the air excitedly, bit on pancake flying everywhere, "They sing in my tummy like a warglobble snockcake!"

Not really wanted to know what that was, exactly, Sarah giggled and her eyes briefly met again with Robin's. A sudden hot feeling made her look away, like his glowing gaze had burned her, and she quickly returned to her own breakfast.

_Boys..._


End file.
